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"How much did Father Christmas's sled cost? Zero, it was on the house."

This quip is greeted with moans that resonate through a warehouse in the capital.

We're at a humor-evaluation session with a company that makes supplies for gatherings. Its repertoire includes Christmas crackers.

The firm's founder smiles, nearly sheepishly at the gag. But the joke has been selected and will appear in future crackers.

"The success is gauged by the joke by the volume of groans and the loudness of the groans around the table," she says.

The key to a good holiday cracker pun is not the identical as a stand-up joke in itself. It is entirely about the context - in this instance, the shared laughter of the Christmas dinner table with grandparents, kids and possibly friends.

"You want the gag to be a thing that brings the child together with the grandparent," she states.

The Neuroscience Of Communal Laughter

Gathering to experience shared amusement is not only nothing new, experts say, it is probably to be older than humanity.

"Therefore when you are chuckling with others around the holiday dinner you are dropping into what's almost certainly a really primordial mammalian play sound," explains a professor.

Communal amusement, she explains, aids in forge and strengthen social connections between people.

Scientists have discovered that a lack of such social exchanges can significantly damage both psychological and bodily well-being.

"The people you talk to, and laugh with, it results in increased levels of 'happy chemical' release," the professor adds.

Endorphins are the body's "feel-good compounds" and are produced both to reduce tension and discomfort and in reaction to enjoyable activities, such as chuckling with friends over a truly terrible Christmas cracker joke.

"You're not just chuckling at a silly joke with a holiday cracker," the expert says. "You are actually performing a lot of the truly important task of making, maintaining the connections you have with the people you love."

What Occurs Inside the Mind?

But what is truly taking place within the mind when we hear a gag?

An awful lot happens in response to humour, it turns out.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a kind of neural imager which shows which parts of the brain are working harder, scientists have been able to chart the areas that get more blood flow.

Testing involves scanning the minds of healthy subjects and then exposing them to a database of funny words, paired with either a non-emotional sound, or recorded chuckles.

"In the scanner we got a very interesting activation pattern of activation," notes the neuroscientist.

A gag activates not just the areas of the brain responsible for auditory processing and understanding speech, but also brain areas associated with both preparation and starting motion and those linked to sight and memory.

Combine all of this together, and people listening to a joke have a complex series of neural reactions that support the amusement we hear.

The Infectious Nature of Laughter

Scientists found that when a funny word is paired with chuckles there is a greater reaction in the mind than the identical phrase when accompanied by a non-emotional sound.

"This was in parts of the mind that you would employ to move your expression into a smile or a laugh," the professor says.

It indicates people are not just responding to funny words, they are reacting to the laughter that follows them.

Laughter, says the expert, can be infectious.

So what does this imply for the laughter found around a Christmas gathering?

"You laugh more when you know people," she says, "and laughter increases more when you are fond of them or care for them."

When it comes to festive cracker jokes, she explains, the positive effect is more probable to be triggered not by the joke in itself, but from the reaction to it.

"The laughter is key. The joke is the dreadful Christmas cracker pun, and it's just a reason to laugh as a group."

The Quest for the Ideal Festive Pun

Will we ever discover the ultimate joke?

Probably not, but that has not stopped experts from trying to.

In 2001, a psychologist set up a research project for the planet's most humorous joke.

Over 40,000 jokes later, with scores lodged by hundreds of thousands of people globally, he has a clearer understanding than many as to what works and what does not.

The perfect Christmas cracker pun needs to be short, he explains.

"They must also be bad gags, puns that make us groan," he adds.

The increasingly "awful" the gag, he states the better.

"The reason is that if no-one finds it funny – it's the gag's shortcoming, not yours.

"The fascinating part about the Christmas cracker puns is that not one person find them humorous.

"It creates a common moment around the table and I believe it's wonderful."